Interview Across a Breakfast Table: Tattoo Me

Each day between now and the start of the Texas Library Association conference — a date both arbitrary and not that far off — we’re each going to answer a question selected by the other, choosing from one of four on a randomly picked game card.

Did I explain that right? I think I explained that right. Let’s get going, and you can decide for yourself whether I explained that right.

Here’s the question Jenny picked for me for today:

If you had a tattoo, where would it be and what would it be?

Man, I thought this would be an easy one! “A Woody Woodpecker tattoo on my chest or shoulder,” I was going to say, reasoning that a few folks out there would know exactly what I was referring to: the matching tattoos sported by H.I. McDunnough and the Lost Biker of the Apocalypse in one of my favorite movies, Raising Arizona.

Then I went looking for a video clip, only to discover that the tattoo is not of Woody Woodpecker after all. It is, in fact, the logo for muffler maker Thrush. Or maybe it’s the logo for Clay Smith Cams. Or both. There’s a lot more backstory and debate about that tattoo than I would have expected.

But whatever it’s called, that’s what I would get. And I would agree with the name used by anyone who recognized it, though I would suspect that anyone who didn’t call it a Woody Woodpecker tattoo had too much time on his hands.